The present invention relates to a patient information management method which enables a hospital or other organizations to store patient information in a public place while maintaining the secret thereof, and a system employing the method.
Patient information such as patient diagnostic information created by diagnostic devices and a doctor is useful for the doctor to know disease progress and previous treatments of a patient concerned when the patient comes to the hospital again for treatment. Therefore, the hospital stores the patient information in a storage device for a predetermined period. To store a huge amount of such patient information, the hospital must purchase and install a large-scale storage device having a large storage capacity.
However, there is a problem that the purchase and installation of a large-scale storage device imposes a large burden on the hospital spatially and economically. Also, since it is difficult to predict a storage capacity required for the storage device, there is a problem that, after the purchase of the storage device, the storage capacity of the storage device becomes insufficient or larger than needed.
In the case where a patient changes a current hospital, it is desirable that a new hospital can use patient information of the patient such as previous diagnostic information. However, conventionally, it has been difficult to efficiently use such patient information. Also, patient information should not be released without limitation because it relates to the privacy of a patient concerned and because of circumstances on the part of a hospital that created the patient information.